Mentatul

Tag: consciousness

  • Interaction and the Spectrum of Love

    Interaction and the Spectrum of Love

    Existence is enriched through interaction. Any interaction, no matter how insignificant, gives birth to a relationship. A consciousness that exists by itself, in an empty Universe, cannot interact with anything, cannot experience any relationship. Such a situation may perhaps be worse than non-existence (*).

    Interaction is richer between species that have more in common, peaking when it involves members of the same species. There can be little argument that the most constructive (beneficial, pleasant) type of interaction is love. The nature, meaning and purpose of love has been debated by scientists, philosophers, mystics and all in between. Its overriding power has remained difficult to explain, even though many disciplines seem to think they have the right answer.

    Legalizing love

    Most healthy humans yearn for love. In spite of this, in a large part of the world, few people venture to have a conversation about love or use “I love you” outside relationships with family or intimate partners. This is a widespread social problem. The results of this schism can be seen everywhere.

    Many people today face isolation, unhappiness and depression. Without the emotional nourishment of love, it is very easy for entire social groups to become ideological prey to intellectual viruses such as consumerism, racism and nationalism.

    But the culture of “I love you” is returning. Families are starting to realize that saying this to their children results in a happier family life and more emotionally secure offspring. Friends are rediscovering the value of sharing this honest feeling towards each other. It is important for people to raise their awareness of how love makes them feel, so that they more actively share and spread this emotion.

    The spectrum of love

    Throughout life we encounter countless avatars of love. There is the love for family, for friends and even the love of one’s so-called enemies, which stop being enemies when empathy and love work as they should. Every interaction becomes a relationship and any relationship can be one of love. What is life if not an exploration of all the ways love can be felt?

    It is certainly true of us humans that we are all of the same family. Even though the formation of our society has its roots in the necessary creation of survival-related advantages, we have outgrown these necessities. Especially during this age of post-scarcity, there are very few reasons why we should keep falling prey to our survival instinct and give into fear and hate. Our society is transforming from a stage of mere mutual interest towards one of brotherhood and sisterhood.

    As our consciousness refines, we will continue to expand the borders of what we perceive as “family”. One day, we will reach a stage when we will perceive every single thing in this Universe, regardless of our current definition of life, as part of the same family simply by virtue of existing. Stars, humans, atoms and blades of grass, we are all children of existence.

    The great attractor

    Some people see love as a sort of force. It is. Any relationship that is predominantly loving is a relationship where the two sides will grow closer together. There probably are scientific reasons for this behavior in life forms. We know that complex intelligence can live and express love more fully. It is interesting that the Universe has given birth to such a constructive outcome. Even when rationalized as “an instinct for procreation”, love maintains its quality of being able to build towards more love.

    The more interactions one has, the more of the spectrum of love one experiences. The Universe can thus be seen as a sort of museum of love, a collection of nearly infinite ways of experiencing and enriching the feeling. Through evolution, there is little doubt that this process will soar to unfathomable heights of conscious emotion.

    There is an interesting parallel between love and another primordial process. It’s the same process that has given birth to every atom in our bodies: nuclear fusion. The light that allows us to live is the result of hydrogen atoms joining together to form helium atoms inside the Sun. Earth exists because another star, long before the Sun, has spread the atoms it created inside across this region of the Universe. Fusion, like love, is a constructive process.

    Interactions nourished by love are of a healing nature. Friendship for example is a relationship of love that can endure many hardships and provides a solid life pillar to those involved. Let us also consider the love towards one self, for it is extremely powerful. This reflected interaction can be so powerful that it can become a drug. The addiction to self-love can lead to serious psychological problems such as narcissism or megalomania.

    It is important that we, as a society, offer enough love to each other so that we do not fall into the trap of self-love. Instead, it is best to see self-love as just another facet of the emotion, therefore not allowing self-love to suffocate the love of everything else around us. This is especially important as everything around us is also part of the same family. Losing sight of this deprives one of the opportunities to fully explore love.

    Look around you, see who looks like they need some love. Don’t limit yourself to your family or friends. Work outwards. Get that loving vibe flowing to your coworkers, dare to reach out to the newest person in your life, somebody you just met.

    Look around you, see who radiates love. Embrace it, absorb it, learn from it. Love can be a skill and like any skill it can be perfected through practice and observation. So get into the business of radiating love because love breeds love. And to also be a bit pragmatic, it’s important to mention that this emotion opens doors that no amount of money or power can open.

    In closing, I’ll share something I wrote about love on the 1st of January 2014:

    I shall build my life for the sole purpose of expressing Love NOW; not tomorrow, not next month, but NOW. My mind will become the antenna that picks up the Love that surrounds me, and my soul will be the sun that shines it through my body. I shall not keep this Love hostage in myself. I will beam it across the Universe and bestow it on family, teachers, friends, those who like me AND those who don’t. I shall love Man, Animal, Plant, Stone and Star, for Love is the almighty, transcending force that brings meaning to our existence. And when the NOW becomes an eternal monument to Love, I WILL BE HAPPY, for my life now truly lives.

     

    This article is the second part of The “Art of Peace” Trilogy^.

     

    (*)^ Perhaps this is why in several spiritual traditions, the godhead is said to create companions for itself or forget itself and split into myriad other beings in order to rediscover itself (hopefully having some fun in the process).

    [ax_meta fbimgurl=’http://mentatul.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/01958-InteractionAndTheSpectrumOfLove-Share.jpg’ lnimgurl=’http://mentatul.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/01958-InteractionAndTheSpectrumOfLove-Thumb.jpg’ fbimgw=’1170′ fbimgh=’350′ lnimgw=’250′ lnimgh=’250′ title=’Interaction and the Spectrum of Love’ desc=’There can be little argument that the most constructive (beneficial, pleasant) type of interaction is love.’]

  • The Earth without Art Is Just Eh…

    The Earth without Art Is Just Eh…

    This cute pun is quite old indeed by now, but I praise the anonymous that put forward these most beautiful words. A disarming, naked truth shines with amusement from this simple sentence, a lyrical gem.

    Personally, by “art” I do not understand “the arts”, as in: “a rather limited range of accepted creative expression and style”. My definition of art is “anything that expresses free will to draw an intense emotional response”. Food can be art, coming up with a beautiful surprise for a friend can be art.

    And when I say “free will”, I mean whatever each being uses as a motivator for actions. We call it “instinct” in other beings in order to separate it from the higher level of consciousness at which we believe ourselves to be. But a wolf has free will even if in its world it has a completely different (wolf-)rationalization than in ours.

    From the long lasting to the ephemeral, art has infinite manifestations, just like the Universe that gave it birth. Living this life is the art we are all given time to perform.

    [ax_meta lnimgurl=’http://mentatul.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/01835-EarthWithoutArtIsJustEh-Thumb.jpg’ lnimgw=’250′ lnimgh=’250′ title=’The Earth without Art Is Just Eh…’ desc=’The disarming, naked truth shines with amusement from this simple sentence, a lyrical gem.’]

  • About Those Animals Again

    About Those Animals Again

    Recent studies show that ducks may be capable of abstract thinking. Scientists have reached this conclusion after hatching about a hundred ducklings and playing shape games with them while they were imprisoned in an enclosure:

    www.csmonitor.com/Science/2016/0714/Ducks-might-be-capable-of-abstract-thought-say-scientists^

    The fact that we’re the dominant species on this planet certainly has its perks. I suppose it would also be just fine if a race of curious aliens starts taking our babies away and make them crawl after floating spheres and cubes in order to examine how their curiosity develops.

    Oh, did you know we’re able to hatch chicks without eggshells?

    http://www.snopes.com/chicks-hatched-without-eggshell/^

    Wouldn’t it be great if those aliens would start to populate our planet with babies grown in grocery bags with tubes rather than a mother’s womb? Do you think those children would turn out smarter and perhaps less merciless than we are?

    And last but not least, here’s one last bitter pill for the day:

    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/worlds-saddest-zoo-grandview-aquarium_us_578c8b3be4b03fc3ee514af2^

    Congratulations brothers and sisters, both for causing this and for fighting against it. Sarcasm doesn’t go well with optimism, does it?

    Sharkasm
    Sharkasm

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  • This Guy Talked to God

    This Guy Talked to God

    At long last, finally there’s somebody in our current generation that managed to talk to God! It’s been some time since this last happened, but judging by what this person wrote, he may belong to a new generation of prophets. Or maybe he’s just a good writer. Here, judge for yourself:

    http://www.fullmoon.nu/articles/art.php?id=tal^

    There’s quite a lot of interesting reading on that philosopher’s website.

    And in case his website ever goes down, I’ve saved the PDF and the text. You can find them at the links below:

    www.mentatul.com/axup/Harry Stottle – Talking to God.docx^

    www.mentatul.com/axup/Harry Stottle – Talking to God.pdf^

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  • The Intellectual Diet

    The Intellectual Diet

    Just like the body is what it eats, the mind is what it experiences. This is a truth with vast and grave implications when it comes to the types of entertainment we invest our time in. Entertainment is a highly efficient social programming tool because, when entertained, the mind is open and relaxed. While in this state, it is easier for toxic messages to escape our scrutiny and infiltrate our thoughts.

    A simple example about how entertainment has negatively affected our society is the impressive range of stereotypes it helped create. We need look no further than the objectification of both women and men. The silent enforcement of ideal body types starts as early as the first cartoons kids watch and continues throughout the adult life, slowly dripping into our minds from movies to magazine covers and commercials.

    Desensitize through violence

    Let’s start with a short thought experiment. Let’s imagine a person that has almost never seen other people getting hurt, shot or killed in movies, games or news. Now let’s say a military power decides to invade another country and the news suddenly broadcasts a scene of carnage. How would such a person react?

    I’m pretty sure that in most cases, outrage would be a likely reaction. Politicians would suddenly have a much harder time selling the wars that the weapon manufacturers so badly want to happen. It’s quite likely that we’d see a drop in violent crime as well. This is quite a simple conclusion based on the fact that the mind is shaped by what it experiences and what is obviously passing as “entertainment” these days.

    To be clear: I do not propose that we censor violent movies or games or that we don’t show the news as it is. As I grew up, I was exposed to plenty of violent entertainment and realities. I still play a few rather gory computer games. What I’m saying is that perhaps we need to take into consideration the quantities in which we absorb such imagery.

    I believe that one of the purposes of this seriously biased towards violence entertainment style we are subjected to is to desensitize us to murder. It’s also easy profits for whoever produces such intellectual drugs: the brain is easily hooked on this sort of stimulation, because it taps into the primal, savage survival instinct. Like any drug, it is needed in increased quantities as the mind develops tolerance for it. We start our children with gun toys and cartoon battles and as they grow up, they’re left craving for more of the same.

    Violence is present in all forms of art, but more recently, movies and video games have spread it more efficiently than ever. All this happens in a day and age when the race for survival is clearly not a matter of “dog eat dog” anymore. Given our vast resources and technology, it is not necessary that we massacre each other, or other beings for that matter.

    Creating fake ambitions

    Our will to survive is at the base of yet another important area of our behavior. This is probably even easier to tap into than the areas of our brain that are pleased by violent entertainment. You might have guessed it already: I’m referring to the desire to procreate. Sex is an excellent tool for selling products and creating fake ambitions (be thin, smell good, use certain brands to gain the approval of the opposite sex).

    Unfortunately, the content shown on TV or “official” channels on the Internet is often seen as a sort of authority, even when it comes to advertisement. This is completely counter-intuitive, since advertisers are anything but altruistic. Most advertised products don’t have anything to do with improving our health; quite the opposite, actually.

    Just a couple of decades ago we were advertising cancer. I’m quite sure most of the “beauty chemicals” advertised today are dangerous, although, hopefully, not quite as dangerous as the additives they’ve been stuffing our tobacco with.

    Of course, it all goes way beyond advertisement. A lot of the entertainment beamed at us can be considered cultural weaponry, which is used to make us adopt certain lifestyles. There are many reasons for this, ranging from something as simple as profits (making us buy various products) down to truly dangerous society-changing opinion building (such as shaping political preferences, ideological orientation or religious affiliation).

    The reason I use the word “weaponry” is because we are dealing here with actions that tamper with our minds, ultimately causing damage to our society. Perhaps the social standards haven’t advanced yet to the stage where we can own-up to the fact that we’re producing a lot of mind-corrupting junk, but this doesn’t mean it’s not time to start exposing it for what it is.

    Solutions

    The best solution I can imagine (and have started applying for myself) is adopting an intellectual diet. However, this must be voluntary. We can’t go about it by declaring “war on violence”. Censorship is not the way. Prohibition never worked and there isn’t any proof that it ever will. Humans’ desire to be free is too powerful.

    We should aim towards increasing awareness regarding toxic entertainment. Most people I approached regarding this subject have agreed that the vast majority of movies being shown in cinemas today are utter junk. For me, this is a sign that we are already aware of the problem. The only and most important other step necessary is taking action and rejecting the content that abuses and insults our intellect.

    Therefore, content creators should be encouraged to gradually improve their output and use it to educate the public. If we – as a society – decide that it is important to surround ourselves with positive art forms, I have little doubt that it is possible, within a couple of decades, to witness a pivotal change in our collective consciousness.

    This change should not be seen as a threat to the economy, but rather as an opportunity to explore new challenges. If anything, humans are inventive. As with any evolutionary changes, new opportunities for profit will present themselves. Yes, a change in the intellectual environment could prove fatal for some economic entities, but then again, we don’t live in the jungle anymore so I’m quite hopeful nobody will die of hunger because of this.

    [ax_meta fbimgurl=’http://mentatul.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/00421-TheIntellectualDiet-Share.jpg’ lnimgurl=’http://mentatul.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/00421-TheIntellectualDiet-Thumb.jpg’ fbimgw=’1170′ fbimgh=’350′ lnimgw=’250′ lnimgh=’250′ title=’The Intellectual Diet’ desc=’Just like the body is what it eats, the mind is what it experiences. This is a truth with vast and grave implications when it comes to the types of entertainment we invest our time in.’]

  • Dolphins Get High Too

    Dolphins Get High Too

    We’ve known for many years that several species of animals get drunk by eating fermented fruits. In 2013, biologists have made yet another surprising discovery. Groups of dolphins get high by chewing on puffer fish. After obtaining a sufficient amount of perception-altering neurotoxin from the creature, they pass it to another dolphin in the group.

    Here’s the story, more than two years old by now:

    http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/nature/dolphins-deliberately-get-high-on-puffer-fish-nerve-toxins-by-carefully-chewing-and-passing-them-9030126.html^

    Good job, dolphins! Can’t light a cigarette? Fermentation doesn’t work? Then use another creature’s venom. Truly fantastic! This behavior adds to the theory that there is an interesting drive present in all living creatures: an unexplainable desire to change their perception of the surrounding environment. Given some countries’ policies regarding consciousness-altering substances, this is important food for thought.

    Nature surely never ceases to amaze. Why am I writing about this in 2016? Simply because I was really fascinated by the method that dolphins use and I want as many people as possible to know about such a wonder – just doing my job when it comes to “sharing is caring”. It’s also something that I need to have on this website.

    And because I want this posting to also contain some new information about our fellow lifeforms, here’s a recent (unrelated) discovery about birds and crocodiles. Impressive stuff:

    http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/ct-birds-alligators-study-20160302-story.html^

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  • Ravens Might Have a Theory of Mind

    Ravens Might Have a Theory of Mind

    Another month, another revelation about the intelligence of other beings sharing the ride here with us, on Earth. Especially during the past couple of decades, our understanding of the various creatures inhabiting this planet has advanced formidably, not only as a result of technological progress but also due to our maturing as a species. We’re starting to awaken to the fact that we should perhaps take more care of our ecosystem and the beautiful planet we live on. With this step forward, comes a perpetually-renewing interest in other forms of life.

    This recent discovery is about the Theory of Mind^, which is the ability to attribute mental states – beliefs, intents, desires, pretending, knowledge, etc. – to oneself and others and to understand that others have beliefs, desires, intentions, and perspectives that are different from one’s own. It’s one of the building blocks of consciousness. And ravens appear to have it.

    Here’s the article where you can read more about the discovery:

    http://www.csmonitor.com/Science/2016/0202/Ravens-might-possess-a-Theory-of-Mind-say-scientists^

    After reading about various such discoveries in the past decade, I can’t say I’m surprised. We’re slowly waking up to the fact that intelligence cannot be defined or constrained by our anthropomorphic boundaries. Life is an incredibly diverse and complex process. Rather than dominating and abusing it, I hope we will continue on our path towards respect, knowledge and awareness.

    [ax_meta lnimgurl=’http://mentatul.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/00304-RavensTheoryOfMind-Thumb.jpg’ lnimgw=’250′ lnimgh=’250′ title=’Ravens Might Have a Theory of Mind’ desc=’Another month, another revelation about the intelligence of other beings sharing the ride here with us, on Earth.’]